1. Technical Field
The present disclosure relates to a surgical instrument and method of forming a staple over a structural component to clamp tissue during a wound closure procedure. More particularly, the present disclosure relates to an anvil assembly incorporating a clamping wire and staple pockets configured to form tissue penetrating ends of a staple about the clamping wire to secure tissues during a wound closure procedure.
2. Background of Related Art
Surgical stapling devices are employed by surgeons to sequentially or simultaneously apply one or more rows of fasteners, e.g., staples or two-part fasteners, to body tissue for the purpose of joining segments of body tissue together. Such devices generally consist of a pair of jaws or finger-like structures between which the body tissue to be joined is placed. When the stapling device is actuated, or “fired”, longitudinally moving firing bars contact staple drive members in one of the jaws. The staple drive members push the surgical staples through the body tissue and into an anvil in the opposite jaw which crimps the staples closed. If tissue is to be removed or separated, a knife blade can be provided in the jaws of the device to cut the tissue between the lines of staples.
When stapling relatively thin or fragile tissues, it is important to effectively seal the staple line against air or fluid leakage. Additionally, it is often necessary to reinforce the staple line against the tissue to prevent tears in the tissue or pulling of the staples through the tissue. One method of preventing tears or pull through involves the placement of a reinforcing or “buttress” material between the backspan of the staple and the underlying tissue. In this method, a layer of buttress material is placed against the tissue and the tissue is stapled in conventional manner. In more recent methods, the buttress material is positioned on the stapling instrument itself prior to stapling the tissue. An example of this is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,542,594 to McKean et al. In McKean et al. a tube of buttress material is slipped over the jaw of the stapler. The stapler is then actuated to staple the subject tissue and secure the buttress material between the tissue and staple line to reinforce the tissue and staple line.
Thus, it would be desirable to provide a system of attaching localized reinforcing material to an anvil of a surgical stapling instrument. It would be further desirable to provide a system of attaching a limited amount of buttress material to either side of a knife groove formed in an anvil of a surgical stapling instrument such that the material is localized on either side of the staple line to avoid having to cut the reinforcing material. It would be still further desirable to provide an anvil having staple clinching pockets configured to bend tissue penetrating ends of a surgical staple over the reinforcing material and back into the tissues to further secure the reinforcing material to the tissues and without penetrating the reinforcing material.